Banditos! Banditos! Banditos!

Edible Epaulets

These were a huge hit at the Memorial Day barbeque!

Ingredients

1 lb. ground bison meat

2 cups corn meal

1 stick butter, chilled

1/2 cup ice water

salt, pepper, Montreal steak seasoning, adobo, curry powder, whatever

(seriously, you could use Pop Rocks, it doesn't matter, it all gets deep fried)

soba noodles

nicely ironed shirts you don't mind ruining

The Dough

With well-floured hands, tear the butter into little crumbs and work it into the corn meal, along with about 1/2 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp pepper.  Try not to work it over too much.  Add the ice water, 1 tsp at a time, mashing it up with a fork, until the dough just barely holds together, then toss the rest of the ice water, or drink it, or save it for next Memorial Day.  Let the dough chill in the fridge while you cook up the meat.

The Meat

Sauté it in some oil and your seasoning of choice.  Don't overcook it because bison gets tough.  Don't cook it near a cliff because bison gets spooked and runs over the edge.

Dough, Part II

Roll out the dough to about 1/4 inch thick on a well-floured board.  The rolling pin should be well-floured as well.  Hell, just put flour on everything in the house, it's easier.  Then cut it into circles, six or seven inches in diameter.  The size of the epaulets does not necessarily indicate rank, but rather the amount of delicious meat filling.  Put several spoonfuls of meat filling on a circle, cover it with another circle, and use a fork to seal the edges tightly.

Soba Noodles

Boil water, cook the soba noodles until al dente, or whatever the Japanese term for al dente is.  Drain.

Deep Fry

Fill a big pot with oil and deep fry the epaulets one at a time.  Health-conscious chefs can use sunflower oil or some other light oil.  Less health-conscious chefs can avoid oil altogether and use plu gras, or fill the whole pot with bacon fat.  The epaulets are done when they're golden and crispy all over.  They're overdone if they explode.  Just before that happens, throw in a handful of soba noodles, which should stick to them like a tasseled fringe.  Pull them out with tongs and let them dry on the nicely ironed shirts, one on each shoulder.  Put on the shirt, and

March Around Town Looking Yummy

Feel free to spend all day drinking grog, referring to yourself as Admiral Tasty of H.M.S. Picnic Surprise, and inviting everyone to take a bite of your edible epaulets.  By the end of the day, you'll be covered in glory, or possibly gravy, rolling about on the grass amid millions of festive, adoring fire ants.

Technorati Tags: picnics, Memorial Day, epaulets, edible epaulets, recipes

I Need A Burner

I need a burner.  Are you using that burner?  I'm cooking food.  It's here, in a pan.  Uncooked.

That's your burner?  Whatever, I'm easy.  Can I use that other burner?

No?  Can I use that one than?

What about that one?

Well, what about that one?  Yes, I know that's the first burner.  I thought maybe you had finished with it while I was asking about the other ones.  I need a burner.

Maybe I haven't been clear.  I'm trying to make food.  In order to make food, I need to cook it.  If I don't cook it, it's not food, it's just ingredients.  Cooking requires heat, which comes from a burner, etc.  It gets a little technical but the upshot is that those things, in front of you?  I need one.  Move.

We're not here to talk about your pan.  This is about the burner under the pan.  Focus.

Listen to me!  We don't have much time!  If you're cold you should put on a sweater, and if you like looking at fire, Hanukkah is coming up and it's just a huge damn festival of lights.  But right now - look at me! - I need a burner, and you, for some perverse reason, insist on standing between my food and its rightful burner.  You just burner blocked me.  Not cool.

You know I wouldn't ask for myself.  This is about the food.  It really, really wants to be cooked, on a burner.  Look at it, you can tell.  Oh please, make its wishes come true!

Let's play a game.  I'm going to close my eyes, and when I open them, you will have freed up a burner.  Here we go.  My eyes are closed.  Is the burner free?  I'm going to open my eyes ...

Yay!  A burner!  Finally.  See?  Now I shall cook.  That wasn't so hard, was it?

What do you mean, you spat in my food?

Technorati Tags: cooking, burners, stoves, Top Chef saliva challenge

Bonus link:  Microwave tips!  You can put metal in one.

The Freshness

As a culinary genius, people often approach me on the street and ask, "How can I tell if my celery is still fresh?"  Here's a handy rule of thumb:

Can you tie it in a knot?

Technorati Tags: celery, knots, fresh vegetables, I should check the fridge more often, no gumbo tonight

In the Village of the Blue

"Hey there, neighbor!  Looks like you're washing your smurf."

"My house?  Do you mean I'm washing my house?  That's what I'm doing, yes."

"It's a nice smurfy day for it."

"Sunny day?  Yes, it is sunny.  But I'm washing it because some kids tagged it.  Next time you see Papa Smurf, tell him I'm getting sick of having 'Smurfy Smurf' written on my house."

"Oh my Smurf!  That's what they wrote?"

"What?  What's "Smurfy Smurf" mean?  I have no context."

"Oh is that all?  For a second there I thought you said 'Smurfy Smurf.'  Whew!  Listen, don't worry about that.  'Smurfy Smurf' is just an homage to Smurfy Smurf.  You know, Smurfy Smurf, the smurf smurf."

"Again, no context.  Remember when we talked about helping words?  Use your helping words."

"But say, neighbor, why are you using a smurf to clean your smurf?  We live in smurfrooms."

"Hose, using a hose, the second one is house again, and, wait, did you just say smurfroom?  Smurf is the word for mush?  Really?"

"Smurfrooms, right.  You can't clean a smurfroom with water.  You need a smurfroom brush."

"I do not need a mushroom brush, thank you very much.  In many cases,  you can run a mushroom briefly under water and it won't get waterlogged at all.  It is a trade off between a little bit of extra water and completely stripping the mushroom with harsh, abrasive bristles.  You can also use a wet paper towel, and then a dry one."

"So you're saying that a mushroom brush is worthless?"

"No, they have their uses, but it's all about context.  Let the mushroom help you decide, based on how dirty it is, and how hardy or absorbent -- wait, what did you just say?  What?"

"Is a mushroom brush worth--"

"YOU JUST SAID IT!  I HEARD YOU!  You know how to say mushroom!  Say it again!"

"Sm . . . smur . . . smushroom?"

"Close enough!  Say house!"

"House?  Is that your word for smurf?  The smurf you live in?"

"Yes, that's right!  Oh, you don't know how happy you've made me!  All this time, in this tiny village, with everyone saying smurf this and smurf that, and now you're finally coming around!  Please, you have to tell the others.  They can stop saying smurf if they only try."

"Well, all right, I'll smurf, that is, I'll tell them, but you need to meet us smurfway.  When you mean smurf, just say smurf."

"I will, I'll meet you smurfway.  Just go and smurf the others."

"Hee hee hee!  But I know what you meant.  Yes, I'll go and smurf the others.  Wow, you've got a lot to learn."

Technorati Tags: Smurfs, mushrooms, mushroom brushes, context

Accidental Stilton

I'm friends with a cheesemaker who tells me that sometimes, when making something like Cheddar, the wrong bacteria gets into it somehow and you end up with Stilton.  Stilton is my favorite cheese by far.  I even like the crust.  I realized that I've only had intentional Stilton.  I want to try accidental Stilton.

If I asked the cheesemaker politely, I'm sure he could make me all the accidental Stilton I could eat, but then it wouldn't be accidental.  All he can do is continue to make cheese properly and maybe someday he'll make a mistake.  I wouldn't wish failure on him anyway, even serendipitous, savory, slightly pungent failure.  It might not even count as Stilton anyway, because I think there are a handful of dairies in the English Midlands who have a monopoly on the name.  That's a very European thing, all this idiotic regulation keeping my local dairy from making Stilton.  Cheese wants to be free.  On the other hand, there's something exciting about accidental, illegal Stilton.  That's what I want.

Stilton's a Christmas cheese.  I'm visiting the cheesemaker this Christmas and truly it would be a yuletide miracle if he were to hand me a giant circle of the stuff.  "Did you make this for me?"  "No, I was trying to make Cheddar.  I got fired, but they let me keep the cheese."  "Well, I guess it all worked out then.  Won't you have a bite of Stilton with me?"  The cheesemaker rips open his shirt to reveal that he's wearing a wire.  "We got it, boys.  He called it Stilton.  Enjoy the rest of your cheese -- in jail."

Technorati Tags: Stilton, cheese, mistakes, breaking the law, breakin' the law

Use Your Words

There are literally dozens of words in the English language, and if you want to make it all the way to the secret bonus words (like sesquipedalian, recursion, and portmanteau), you need to expand your vocabulary a little each day.  FreeRice offers a quick, challenging vocabulary quiz with a humanitarian twist; for each correct answer, their sponsors donate 10 grains of rice to hungry people throughout the world via the U.N. World Food Program.  Ten grains may not seem like much, but I played for just a couple of minutes, and earned 400 grains.  Then I measured some rice out on the kitchen table and found out it's a little over two teaspoons.  That would cook up to two tablespoons, if it made sense to cook up that little rice, which of course it doesn't.  Lesson learned: if I play for at least ten easy minutes a day, within a week I'll have an edible amount of rice.  Bonus lesson: rice goes everywhere.  Maybe by the end of the week, I'll have found all the stray grains.  If I threw some boiling water on the floor, they'd swell up and be easier to find.  Be right back.

As a game, FreeRice is very simple but has some nice design features.  A picture of a rapidly-filling bowl provides a little visual reward for every right answer.  Every incorrect answer is a little learning experience, as they immediately display the right choice, along with another question, a tempting chance for redemption.  The ads are simple and unobtrusive, and the game starts on the main page and rolls right along.  Click, click, learn, click, earn more grains, get a little hungry thinking about it, check to see if the floor rice is ready.  (Nope, it still hasn't absorbed all the water.  I threw in a little butter for flavor.)  The difficulty adjusts automatically, using a GRE-like initial assessment and tier system.  I got up to 49 out of 50.  In your face, English!

[SPOILER ALERT]

My favorite word so far was burgoo, which I happened to know as a thick gruel served to 18th century seamen, and nowadays as a soup they make down South.  I just enjoy it when a food-related word comes up.  It's like attacking an enemy in Bookworm Adventures with the word fisticuffs.  Southern burgoo goes well with rice, in fact.  Speaking of rice, I'm pleased to say that my kitchen floor rice was a tour de force of culinary invention.  The butter and saffron (I added saffron) complete the rice's subtle flavor profile, and the slightly caramelized dust bunnies really make the linoleum flavor "pop."  But there's no time to rest on my laurels.  I've got vocabulary to learn, rice to donate, and if I start to feel peckish, storm gutter pilaf.

 

Technorati Tags: FreeRice, Poverty Center, world hunger, rice, burgoo, Bookworm Adventures, fusion cuisine, Michelin stars

Gimme My Taco

Last night, Jacoby Ellsbury stole second base in Game 2 of the World Series.  Now, I'm no baseball expert, but I know that can only mean one thing: free tacos.  Between 2 and 5 p.m. on October 30, anyone in America can demand a free taco at Taco Bell.  However, if you want soda or for some reason the first taco didn't fill you up, that's on your dime.  Also, it's fried crunchy tacos only, so you health conscious folks may want to dump out the innards and wrap it in rice paper or a leaf or whatever you do.

Still, I'm excited.  If everyone in America actually goes out to get their own taco, it'll be a cultural milestone.  Where were you when we got free tacos?  Did you eat yours immediately or wait around for it to appreciate in value?  How'd that work out for you?  Did you pass up the free taco as a protest because no one threw to second base so, technically, maybe Ellsbury didn't steal second?  Personally, I think that's unfair to a good athlete and taco benefactor.  Although I've never heard of Jacoby Ellsbury before, I kind of like him now.  I might follow his career a bit, just in case someday he gives me nachos.

A word of warning:  According to the fine print, "Participating Taco Bell restaurant manager reserves the right to deny Free Taco to any person he/she reasonably believes has already received a Free Taco or has engaged in any other fraudulent activity."  So, if you're scamming the Bell (and I don't advocate it), make sure your disguise is impeccable.  Don't be like those teenagers at Halloween who just flip their cap around and hit the same house twice.  If they're caught they just get sent away without candy.  If the taco jockey twigs to your con, he'll make things pretty spicy for you, my friend.  He's the man who handles your beef.  It's a deadly game of taco roulette.

Technorati Tags: free tacos, Taco Bell, Jacoby Ellsbury, stolen bases

Beans -- A Journey of Discovery

Time was, when I wanted to add beans to a recipe, I'd open a can.  Then one day, as I reached for that cold, indifferent can opener, I thought, Why am I using a machine to cook?  Have I become a robot?  And the answer came:  Of course not.  What an illogical assumption.  Which freaked me the hell out, so I gave up canned beans and started buying Rustic Beans.

Rustic Beans are these dry, shriveled looking beans found in little plastic sacks on the same aisle as the Tin Prison Beans.  You'll see all different kinds of them, but don't get confused, just buy some in your favorite color.  They're so cheap, you can buy tons of them to pave a driveway or to stuff in a gun as emergency buckshot.

Cooking with them is simple as can be.  Just open up the bag, pour them on the ground, and play a little game of This Ain't No Bean.  About half the bag will be little clods of dirt or tiny pebbles that ain't beans.  Remove all of those and unless you have pica, throw them away.  I once got a bag that was all dirt and one bean, whom I named Lucky.  I gave him his freedom.

Now the real fun begins.  Put the beans in a pot, cover them with lots of water, and wait all night.  You could do something else while you're waiting, but if you let these little bean-watching moments slip by, you'll regret it someday.  The bag lists two methods: overnight and quick soak, which involves boiling them a little.  But think about it.  If the shorter method were preferable, wouldn't that be the only one on the bag?  Don't take the easy way out.  Soaking beans, like everything,  is a moral test.  I'm pretty sure that quick soaking is technically a venial sin.

After one sleepless but exciting night, you'll have some swollen, soggy beans sitting in nasty water.  They're like larvae of deliciousness, and you're about to hatch 'em.  Now you can boil them in some new non-stanky water.  And then eat them, of course.  I shouldn't have to tell you everything.  Some possible side dishes: parsley, napkin rings, or a tall glass of the stank water, which you should have saved.  You spent all night with that water.  Did you just throw it away once you got what you wanted?  You just failed another moral test, Captain Callous.  I can't even look at you right now.

So, the next time you get a sudden beany craving, don't open an unfeeling can with a scary machine.  Not even a simple machine, like an inclined plane or a pulley.  Just whip up a batch of safe, analog Rustic Beans.  Also, try not to have especially urgent cravings, because Rustic Beans take all damn night.  That's what separates us from the soulless robots: delayed gratification.  Plus the fact that we eat beans at all.  Eat enough beans and you'll pass the Turing Test with flying colors.  You'll see.

Technorati Tags: beans, robots, sin, tests, overnight soak

English Breakfast

In England, they just call it "breakfast," or "brekkie."  Sometimes "morning dinner," or "prunch."  (Pre-lunch.)  I used to think English Breakfast was just that one kind of tea, but in London, if all you have for breakfast is tea, they think you're a model.  And then the tabloids print hurtful words.  So I loaded up on jolly old solid foods every morning, such as:

 

• Tomahtoes.  Pronounced like it's spelled.  The weirdest and the most consistent feature wherever I went.  Hot tomahtoes, stewed, or grilled, always whole, always cooked.  Sometimes swimming in hot pulp which seeps into your eggs.  I ate them every morning and soon I learned to think that I had inadvertently convinced myself to simulate liking them.  Oh my, they're so good.  Try some.
• Toahst.  The British know how to make toast.  I have nothing but praise for their toast.  With butter, some kind of sunflower oil spread, jam, marmalade, or just a plain slice to soak up eggy tomatoey juice, U.K. toast gets the job done.  Bravo!
• Mushrooms.  Not incorporated into any other part of the meal.  That's a mistake.  But they taste fine.
• Eggs.  Poached, scrambled, hard boiled, etc.  There are never any guarantees with eggs.  Everyone fucks up a little when preparing eggs, but everyone likes their eggs fucked up in some specific way.  There's no specifically British way to fuck up eggs.
• Beans.  Baked beans.  Hell if I know.
• Coffee.  There's some bad coffee oozing around London.  That's our fault.  It's Starbucks.  Just as expensive, just as mediocre.  They also have Costa, which serves even more expensive coffee.  Turns out that's possible.  Huh.
• Tea.  Is it just a cliché to say the tea is very good?  It's very good tea.  I brought some back, just regular tea from a supermarket, the very cheapest brand.  Not only is it superior to the cheapest American brand, it's at least as good as the fancy brands.  And it's from England, so I can put on airs when I brew it.  I estimate that I can put on 38% more airs.
• Sausages.  This will be covered later in the bacon section . . .
• Scones, muffins, and baked goods.  More like baked greats!  The thing about, um . . . let's do bacon now!
• BACON.  Sweet screeching windshield Jesus, the bacon.  I had heard stories, legends really, but I never dreamt -- I need to tell you something about bacon.  What if all the bacon you had ever eaten, what if it were just greasy shadows, cast upon the walls of a cave?  And what if, one day, you waddled out of that cave, and the first thing you saw was a thick, crispy rasher of succulent back bacon?  Would you look away?  Would you dare to nibble, and if you nibbled, would it blind your tongue?
• And don't think I'm referring to "Canadian bacon," either.  I've had Canadian bacon, or at least what we call Canadian bacon.  I don't know what the Canadians eat, but that bacon they pushed on us?  It's a trick.  Check that bacon for Greek soldiers.
• I mean, was that pig?  Can pigs do that?  How can I eat something that can make itself taste that wonderful?  Conundrum!
• At the Tate Modern, I was looking at some Francis Bacon paintings, and although they were disturbing images, I just thought about that morning's breakfast miracle and smiled.  He had no power over me.

Let me tell you a little story.  It's about bacon.  I was driving around Ireland and went into a gas station convenience store for a light breakfast.  The very smallest, cheapest thing was called something like a "breakfast roll" and had four kinds of meat.  There was sausage, blood pudding, something from maybe a sheep, and my beloved bacon -- strips of sizzling, mouth-watering angel meat.  I sat in the parking lot eating it and a golden retriever came over begging for scraps.  I gave him some sausage.  Soon another dog came by and I fed him, too.  With their eyes, they promised me many gifts: riches, wisdom, the location of this ball they found and hid, if I would only give them a bit of bacon.  Well, I gave them sausage, blood pudding, and sheep's ass or whatever, but the bacon was for me alone.  They were cute dogs, but not cute enough.  If Anna Paquin had come by and started making eyes, even she would not have received bacon.  Of course, she's a vegetarian, so if that was the one time she just wanted to try bacon, I wouldn't be selfish about it, so maybe.  It's a somewhat implausible scenario.

Technorati Tags: English breakfast, London, Ireland, bacon, Anna Paquin

Cook Sister!

I made an asparagus and mushroom risotto the other day, which is always a hit, but kind of boring to prepare.  Asparagus and mushroom is my default setting for risotto, and risotto is my default setting for rice cooked in broth.  Sometimes I raise it one level of tastiness to paella, and sometimes lower it to pilaf.  Occasionally I trick the rice and make it into rice pudding, and it's all, "Hey, I thought I could only aspire to paella!  What gives?" and I reply, "No.  You are rice, but you can be pudding.  Tell the others."

Coincidentally, I just found out about Cook Sister!, a great, tasty food blog by a South African expat in London, from her recipe for butternut squash and boerewors risotto.  She explains that boerewors is a coil of sausage "made of several types of meat – usually a combination of beef, lamb and pork, but sometimes ostrich or game meat – combined with cubed pork fat (“spekvet”) and natural preservatives such as vinegar and spices (coriander seeds play a large part!)."  You can order it online in the US.  In DC, there was a place called the Cape Dutch Bakery, in Accokeek, MD, but it closed down a couple years ago.  See, this is where the Banditos! food entries start to edge into food nostalgia.  Rather than useful information, I provide you with the news that a convenient local grocery no longer exists.  The proper mood when reading a Banditos! post should always be unfulfilled longing.  Work on that.

The Cook Sister! boerewors risotto, which actually exists and is pictured here, looks like a great idea, even if I can't easily procure boerewors.  But there are plenty of other sausages available in DC.  Kielbasa, chorizo, Kenyan sausage, bloodwurst -- the important thing is to get some chunks of meat into my next risotto.  I once had some German sausage with brain tissue in it and although flavor-wise it wasn't incredibly special, if you threw that into a risotto you'd have some hard core risotto.  Risotto can be just a little too Parmesan-y, a little rice-y, you know?  Risotto-y.  I want to take risotto up one more level, beyond paella, and make it steak and mashed potatoes.  It sounds crazy, but you know what else is crazy?  Feeling unfulfilled longing for a South African sausage I've never tasted.  And you know what?  I'm doing that right now.

Technorati Tags: food, Cook Sister, boerewors, sausage, risotto, mentally pre-tasting delicious food

Phone in Friday: Menu Items

Pan Seared Shrieking Rodent

Arugula and Goat Cheese Salad with Goat Dressing and Toasted Goatons

Beer Battered Fish Sticks  (Our chef got drunk and beat the shit out of a fish stick)

Forest Grown Chantarelles, Sun Dried Tomatoes and Body Heat Activated Pasta

Alaskan Snow Crab on a Bed of Sig Hansen's Dead Friends

Arroz con Pollo con Queso con Llaves con Pendejo

800 Sharp, Tiny Bones Lightly Dusted with Fish

(Bargain Price!)  Imperfectly Peeled Potatoes Bathed in Orphan's Tears

Mom's Famous Guilt Cobbler

Habanero Juice in Your Eye (Spicy.  Milder chiles available on request.)

Pissaladière Seasoned with Herbes de Provence and You Know What, Just Move to Provence, Motherfucker

A Single, Perfectly Roasted Whale

"Water"

Broken Glass and Tin Foil but Wait!  It's Covered in Saffron!  Eh?  Eh?

Comes with a Shot of Vodka and Let's Leave It at That

Technorati Tags: Friday, Phone in Friday, Food

Suicide Food

Suicide Food features disturbing warped advertisements for meat products where the animals cheerfully exhort you to eat them.  Ben from Seattle, who provides commentary, also has at least four other specialized blogs.  The comments are fun but a bit masochistic because I'm pretty sure he's a vegetarian.  Nowadays I only avoid certain types of meat (foie gras, overfished seafood, roadkill) but I was also a vegetarian for a couple of years and just thinking about meat used to make me feel ill.  That kicks in after just a few months.  Any type of meat cooked any way somehow becomes the most nauseating smell in the world.  That doesn't happen with other foods.  No one gives up carrots and suddenly gets all Little Albert about the color orange.  "Ugh, carrots.  Those grow in the ground, with the worms.  What are you drinking, orange juice?  Huuurrrgh!"

Turn OFF the sound on this video before playing.  It's loud and even more annoying than the green title screens.  It's the only video I could find of the experiment, which is sooo adorable. 

Fun Fact: in 1920, a common child rearing practice was to bring all sorts of objects from the outside world to your baby, because it's never seen anything before.  So at around six months old, you would show it everything in the world, listed alphabetically.  Your house would have one aardvark, one anvil, one ampersand, someone with an astigmatism, an axe, etc.  Now we just show babies picture books but back then parents' garages looked like Noah's Ark if God had been some kind of fucking moron who thought inanimate objects reproduced asexually.

Technorati Tags: Suicide Foods, Little Albert, John Watson, Noah's Ark, Idiot OCD God

Kebooms!

This 4th of July, why not combine the grilling and explosions?  Don't make kebabs, make kebooms!

All you need is a grill, some skewers, kebab fixings, and fireworks.  Beef, shrimp, lamb, bell peppers, onions and pineapples are all classic kebab ingredients, but anything will do as long as it's not too soggy.  Pre-grill it until it's just about done.  Then tie little firecrackers to the skewer, and turn up the flames, so they're sure to pop off.  Stand back!  Really, stand back, it's dangerous.

Q:  Can I still eat the food?  It's covered in gunpowder!

A:  The gunpowder burns right off.  It barely touches the edible parts, if at all.

Q:  My kebab exploded!  It's all over the backyard!

A:  That happens sometimes.  Pick up the chunks and eat them.  Treasure hunt!

Q:  What if the firecracker is a dud?

A:  Sometimes a kebab doesn't cook exactly as planned, but we don't call it a "dud," now do we?  Get some lighter fluid and spray it on there, see if you can get some fire going.

Q:  Are you legally responsible for other people following your recipes?

A:  I'm so very glad you asked that.  The answer is, no.

Technorati Tags: kebooms, kebabs, barbeque, recipes, danger-licious

Hot Weather Cookery

It's 91 degrees here in DC, which means that I'd rather cook a pie using angry words than turn on the oven.  It's smarter to just not cook anything that requires an oven in the first place.  I figure burners are OK if you use them sparingly, and of course, anything that needs to be cooked at only 91 degrees, just put it outside for a while.  One hour at 400 is equivalent to four hours at 100, right?  Here are some old classics of hot weather cookery:

Deep Fried Ice Cubes

Whisk together some egg yolk, flour, and baking soda to make batter.  Roll ice cubes in them.  Deep fry in oil.  You have to do this really quickly because ice cubes have a tendency to melt.

Baked Snapper en Papillote via Gym Class

"En papillote" just means "en paper" en French.  Take a piece of paper, go down to your local lake, and wrap it around a fish.  Now the tricky part: you have to convince the fish he's in gym class walking the track.  Exhort him to keep swimming in a circle, faster and faster, until he overheats and dies.  He should be fully cooked by then.  It may help to draw a Nike swoosh on the paper.

E-Z Bake No-Oven Salad

Take the usual salad ingredients: lettuce, cherry tomatoes, mushrooms, onion slices, raw calf's liver, raw pig's feet, raw contents of raw duck's stomach.  Normally, you should bake the onions, because they're a little overwhelming, but instead, substitute a raw puffer fish, also known as "sashimi fugu."  Any of your dinner guests who might have been put off by all the raw meat will be so busy avoiding the famously poisonous fugu they won't even notice it going down.

Tuna Tartare

Can of tuna.  That's it.  Oh, and a can opener.  Serves 8.

Hearty Lasagna with Baked Ziti on a Bed of Chocolate Cakes

For this, you'll need some lockpicks or a key to the house next door.  Use their oven.  If they come home while you're there, there's a good chance they won't be able to get into the kitchen for a while due to the massive wave of heat pushing them back.  If they do make it in, try to convince them it's their birthday.  A quicker, low calorie alternative: instead of a whole bed of chocolate cakes, just make a futon, and halve the amount of ziti.

Technorati Tags: cooking, hot weather, recipes

We All Go Blind Together

Get ready to get scared!  This is a 100% real conversation I had at with my optometrist yesterday.  Full disclosure: while it is 100% true, it is paraphrased from memory, as I don't write transcripts of my conversations while I have them.  I used to do that, but people were distracted by my personal style of shorthand, which looks just like doodles of hunky Logan from Veronica Mars.  (I'm as baffled as you are.  Imagine how freaked out I was when that show first came on the air.)

Full full disclosure: At one point during this 100% true account, I will start making up lies.  This is for dramatic effect.  But it will be very clear to the reader when I have started lying.  Let's begin.

"So, doc, and this is me talking, how do my eyes look?"

"Well, as your optometrist, I would say they look fine.  Have you experienced any problems?"

"Nary a one.  By the way, I haven't been able to find my usual contact solution, Amo MoisturePlus, lately.  Isn't that the stuff you said would be best for my type of contacts?"

"Oh, you didn't hear?  You should stop using it.  Also, throw away any you have left, and your case, and put in new contacts immediately."

"Do what now?"

"The CDC recalled it last month, due to Acanthamoeba infections.  It's an amoeba found in all sorts of water supplies that doesn't get killed by contact solutions, so if you get it on your contacts, you're at risk for a rare condition called Acanthamoeba keratitis."

"I'm somewhat distressed!  Should I see a doctor?"

"Oh, you would know.  You would have gone blind already.  It takes about 48 hours without treatment, and it's very painful, so you're in the clear.  No worries."

"Yes, worries!  What am I, Leonhard Euler?  Actually, I think I'll just think this, rather than saying it."

"Did you know that Acanthamoeba can be found in swimming pools?  Chlorine doesn't kill it.  I always tell my patients that if you go swimming in your contacts, it's like playing Russian roulette.  It's even in tap water, so you could get it from showering in contacts.  Didn't you ever hear about it on the local news?"

"I don't watch the local news.  I don't like being scared over nothing."

"How's that working out for you?"

[At this point in the transcript, a pterodactyl swoops through the office.  It chases down and eats a leprechaun HINT HINT.]

"Well doc, continuing our conversation, is there anything else I should be worried about?  What about those Jamaican beef patties I love so much."

"Oh noes.  You have teh Jamaican patty fever.  There is no cure for it other than constant infusions of delicious beef."

"But however will I afford such a costly but necessary treatment?"

"You must rely on the kindnesses of the internet peoples.  Maybe if every 1 who reads this sends you just 1 beef patty and then frowards it 2 nine other peoples yor life will be saved.  IT WILL BE A BLESSING UPON THEM."

 

Technorati Tags: CDC, contact solution, recall, acanthamoeba, euler, health, Jamaican beef patties, charity, trickery

OK, that's enough Fallout 3 news.

Their site is getting hammered, and not in a fun, alcoholic way, but I was able to download and watch the Fallout 3 teaser.  It's good.  Doesn't say anything about the mechanics of the game, but it says a lot about the general aesthetic, which seems to be "just like the old Fallout, but in 3-D."  And it's clearly rendered in-engine, or it would look a lot better.  (For example, the chair looks a little blocky.)  So we know that it has some tenuous relation to the actual game, which is always nice.

I enjoy game trailers much more than movie trailers, because they actually try to build anticipation.  Movie trailers show you all the good bits of the movie, attempting to overwhelm you with details.  Here's the funniest joke, here's the biggest explosion, here's a romantic bit, and these are all the main plot points.  A game trailer can never show you the best bits, because you create them as you play the game.  Even in adventure games, the plot is not the real story -- the story is how you interact with the plot.  The play's the thing, so to speak.

The annoying thing about game trailers is that they come out before the game is finished.  By late 2008 Fallout 3 could be a bowling simulator starring a traveling salesman and a bunny.  (That game exists, too.  It's called Hotel Dusk.)  Because they're so damn expensive, you have to predict which games you're likely to enjoy, but the trailer won't help you one bit.  Reviews can help, but surprisingly little, and professional reviewers simmer in a complex, briny stew of motives.  What you need is a friend who likes you a lot and wants to share only the best game experiences with you.  Guess what, baby?  I will be that friend.  You can trust me.  I will eat any snacks you put out but I will not eat all of them.  I will always bring you beverages, I will never hog the controller, and I will sometimes crash on your sofa, if that's cool.  Oh, and I've never heard it, but I'm told I snore.

Technorati Tags: Fallout 3, games, trailer, friendship

Cleanup on Aisle Earth!

7 days until the Fallout 3 teaser, which is how I actually mark time now.  Oh, this darn game!  When I saw all those pipes, my first thought was, "Is there still chlorine and chloramine in the water or can I just put it straight into my aquarium now?"  I'd like to think that even after society has collapsed, I would still take care of my fish.  The cats can go fuck themselves though.

Ashley Cheng, production designer at Bethesda, has a blog.  I try not to look under the hood too much on a game until I've played it for a while, but he doesn't give much away anyway.  I would say that he is reasonably well informed about the game, so you can consider his blog a supplement to the one-stop Fallout information extravaganza that is 3xBanditos.

He also discusses other stuff, like not being able to find "authentic" Chinese takeout in Montgomery County, as opposed to in his hometown of Boston.  Maybe so.  I think the Chinese food around here is all right, but I had Boston Chinese recently, and it was actually very good.  My criteria are wonton soup, crab rangoon, and shrimp with lobster sauce -- the Hades, Zeus, and Poseidon of the meal, respectively.  The only three games I'm excited about this year are of course Fallout 3, BioShock, and Portal (enjoy that last link).  I leave it up to Ashley and the Fallout devs to decide whether their game is my steamy wonton soup, my crunchy crab rangoon, or my savoury shrimp with lobster sauce.  We all have to be on the same page with this metaphor, guys.

Oh, and Halo 3 is the packet of those greasy fried noodles that I'm just going to throw away.  Not that I'm hating on Halo, but screw you, Halo, I hate you.  No offense.

A "foodie" is someone who is capable of digesting food.

The best thing about a BLT is that if you know about acronyms, like I do, you can figure out what's in it. It's made with Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato.  Have you ever heard someone refer to a peanut butter and jelly sandwich as a PBJ?  Well, now you can figure out what's in that too.  I think you'll be surprised!